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<\/a>This is from the introduction by David Biale:<\/p>\n\nStanding somewhere between the dominant position of the\u00a0white majority and the marginal position of peoples of color, Jews respond with ambivalence to the attack of multiculturalism on the Enlightenment. For two centuries Jews have staked their position in Western society on the promise of the Enlightenment. When given the chance, they used emancipation to enormous benefit and they came to repay the Enlightenment with almost excessive gratitude, rushing to adopt political liberalism and cultural rationalism to a much greater degree than any other group. At the same time, the Jewish embrace of the Enlightenment reflected the limitations within the Enlightenment itself: it was Jewish men, much more than\u00a0Jewish women, who realized the benefits of the Enlightenment, so the very enthusiasm\u00a0for the Enlightenment needs to be\u00a0qualified to some degree along gender lines. And Jews also recognize that the very failure of the Enlightenment led to Auschwitz. The dialectic of Jewish Enlightenment therefore oscillates between these two poles of enthusiastic celebration of modern Western culture and awareness of its most horrific results.<\/p>\n
Having finally reaped the fruits of the promise of the Enlightenment, American Jews sometimes ask why liberalism can’t\u00a0do for other marginalized American groups what it has done for them. This is the source of the conflict among Jews about\u00a0affirmative action, a policy often associated with multiculturalism. If Jews historically\u00a0associate quotas with barriers to opportunity, it is then particularly difficult for some to accept such quotas (or similar vehicles) as just means for American society to redress inequities. As beneficiaries, for whatever historical and cultural reasons, of the Enlightenment’s equality of opportunity, some Jews find it hard to understand why such slogans might be\u00a0inadequate in dealing with the\u00a0long-term consequences of slavery. At the same time, however, since probably the greatest beneficiaries of affirmative action have been Jewish women, Jews have just as many\u00a0self-interested reasons to see the virtues of preferences.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n
(Biale\u00a0does not offer a citation for his claim in that last sentence.)<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
This is from the introduction by David Biale: Standing somewhere between the dominant position of the\u00a0white majority and the marginal position of peoples of color, Jews respond with ambivalence to the attack of multiculturalism on the Enlightenment. For two centuries … Continue reading